It's idiotic to think that Obama needed to be black to get as far as he has. I've always joked that if he were white he would already be elected. I think that much of his person. On the other hand, I am mystified that people see the great devil in comments like Ferraro's. The Clinton campaign is obviously very freaked out at the power of Obama's candidacy. They obviously need to rationalize Hillary's weakness one way or another. But I don't think they would want a comment this bitter and wrong to be made by such a high ranking advisor. It's exactly like Bill Clinton's S. Carolina comment about Obama's win there, laying it off on his race and the large black turnout. He was rationalizing and yes it was demeaning and stupid, but people get upset. A racist is someone who judges people on the basis of race. Michael Richards never called anyone a n----r. Richards was freaked out by his own poor performance and when he was heckled he tried to lay it off on some sense of added permission the heckler must have, in Richard's mind, had because he was black. What Richards was saying was - in effect - "Oh sure, you can get away with heckling me because you are a member of this abused group people call n-----s." It came out because Richards was in his own delusional "Lenny Bruce-shock-humor" kind of reality.

Although Ferraro is still unapologetic, her clarifying statements put this in a really different light. She has basically said that when she was picked to be the running mate of Mondale, her "qualifications had nothing to do with it." She is hence so jaded, she projects her own experience onto Obama and assumes his qualifications, like hers, have nothing to do with it.

This is to say, this is a horrible, and horribly *stupid* thing to say. Not sure I would quite go so far as to call it racism as I would projected self-hatred. Maybe she can co-host a show on Fox with Ann Coulter to try to restore her image....

It's hard to apologize before one see their vision was blurred. If what she said was actually true, I don't think it would have been that horrible a thing to say.

Interesting background (from you) re her "projection of her own experience": She really was picked because of her gender.

Agree that "the comment" isn't really racism, tho.

Don't understand your Coulter joke. Ferraro won't be able to restore her image until either she understands what so many people see in Obamba or she sees that even if what she said was true, Obama deserved more respect. steve1480@juno.com

Personally, I think that Ferraro's comments are pretty damaging to both candidacies, to the Democratic party as a whole, and even to the country. I think the entire Democratic Party needs to deeply condemn Ferraro's comments for what they are (an attack on the way the Democratic party nominates people).

The fact that this was pretty clearly at its base an attack on the Democratic Party is why myself and a number of others have suggested Fox News as a career choice.

Her comments are, nonetheless stunningly stupid, even though there seem to be a lot of people who strangely sympathize with them. You are right-- Obama does deserve more respect but this race has become ugly and quite frankly I think that the comments are likely to hurt Hillary more than Obama even if they are just taken at face value.

BTW, I am an Obama supporter, and a white male businessman. People often wonder why I support affirmative action and diversity in hiring. The fact is that without diversity in life experience, ethnic background, an even sometimes race, businesses can't meet the needs of a diverse customer base. The attacks on affirmative action are not just attacks on Blacks, Asians, etc. in the work force, they are also attacks on minorities as marketplace customers.